Spreadsheets and Climate Data

I enjoy creating spreadsheets. I like seeing data organized, and I like to compare the numbers in ways that give me new understanding, or quantify what I may have felt like I already knew. I currently have two spreadsheets active “just for fun.” I will share one here, the other is a work in progress (I am converting lights in my home to compact florescent lights to save power, and I am quantifying how much power I am saving, this activity is limited by budget and availability). The spreadsheet I will share is climate data for Taupo, Vancouver and Seattle.

The motivation for comparing climate data for these three cities is that in the two months I have been in Taupo, it seems that the weather in Seattle and Vancouver is generally better than the weather I have experienced here. This observation was met with a cacophony of arguments by my coworkers rejecting my sound observations of the weather. Some of these co-workers have lived in Vancouver, or Cascadia. Some have only visited, but they all agreed that Taupo has great weather, and Seattle and Vancouver have insufferable weather. The only thing that can be done in such situations is to get on Wikipedia, find some climate data, and prove a large group of people wrong.

Taupo has terrible weather. Were this an academic paper, it would be entitled; “An analysis of climate data for Vancouver, Canada, Seattle, USA, and Taupo, New Zealand to assess favorability for habitation and bicycle commuting.” After the location maps, the first figure that showed climate data would be referred to as something like this: “While Seattle, the Vancouver airport (YVR), and the Vancouver central business district (CBD) have rainier months than Taupo, climate data suggest that Seattle and Vancouver have either comparable climates to Taupo, or better, i.e. Taupo has terrible weather (Fig. 1).” I would normally want to leave it at that, enough said, but in order to celebrate how fantastically correct I am, I'll continue to belabor the point.

Figure 1:  Taupo has terrible weather.

First, a bit on how I went about this, other than copying data from Wikipedia. The value I initially wanted was the number of days that it rains in each city, but it seems whoever compiled the climate data for Wikipedia for Taupo lacked this information. In fact, they seem to have lacked a great deal of information. Owing to the fact that I am lazy, or do not really care, or something along those lines, I have not attempted to find more complete data. I decided that three numbers could capture the climate, average daily high by month, average daily low by month, and average daily precipitation by month. Today it occurred to me that average wind speed (while riding straight into strong winds) would be a useful addition, oh well. Next, I reorganized the months by winter solstice, whereby month 1 is January in the Northern Hemisphere, and July in the Southern Hemisphere, and month 12 is December in the Northern Hemisphere and June in the Southern Hemisphere. Finally, I plotted a scatter plot with all of the data. Then, the fun began (the “fun” being realizing how right I was, the traditional fun started with opening Open Office Calc).

All three cities have a similar amount of seasonality when it comes to temperature. Taupo tends to have the highest average daily high. The daily low is closer, but frequently lower in Taupo. For the bicycle commuter, this is an important number. I rarely commute during the hottest part of the day, though I do often commute to work before the sun has heated the air, and the night's cold is still lingering in the gullies along my route. Thus, for the bicycle commuter, the lowest lows are not made up for by the highest highs. Further, for favorability for habitation, I would argue that while an outside temperature of 72 is probably ideal, a narrow temperature range is also very important. Given two cities, one with a high of 87 and low of 57, and one with a high of 65 and low of 55, I would take 65 and 55. A third city with high of 90 and low of 80 would also be more favorable than the first city. The average temperature in the first city is an ideal 72, but at almost 90 during the heat of the day residents will want to be wearing shorts, running fans or air conditioners, and drinking a cool beverage on a shady veranda at noon. In the mornings, evenings and nights the temperature drops below sixty, and the residents will want to wear long pants and a jacket, running heaters in their homes, and cuddling under blankets at night. This means that they have to carry a change of clothes to be comfortable, and pay to both heat and cool their homes. In the second and third cities, the residents plan on a temperature, grab a jacket, or an ice water, and go about their day. In this way, both Seattle and Vancouver have nicer temperatures than Taupo.

Perhaps the most important number is precipitation. Rain can be dressed for, much like any other weather. It can feel oppressive, but like anything else, a little prior planning, and you can be reasonably comfortable in the rain. Vancouverites have to deal with the most rain overall, and Seattleites the least. In both of those cities, residents can expect months 1, 10, 11 and 12 to be rainier than in Taupo. Vancouverites have to deal with the rainiest month 2 as well (Seattle and Taupo tie for second). For these four/five months, it is much rainier. The Seattleite and Vancouverite must plan for rain most days. They will, accordingly, adjust their attire to a winter wardrobe. The resident of Taupo must have the wet and dry wardrobe ready throughout the year! During months 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 (the majority of the year) the Kiwi will endure more rain, and, like the other five months, must have at the ready wet and dry weather clothing!

This post may come across as very negative, but it is not necessarily meant to be so. I did not ever feel that the weather in Seattle or Vancouver was “terrible,” it was difficult to go from sun everyday, to cloudy many days, but it was not terrible. The use of the world terrible is mostly in response to my co-workers' indignant, “Vancouver (and/or Seattle) has terrible weather.” Thus, if the Pacific Northwest has terrible weather, then it follows that Taupo has terrible weather, since it is worse here. Kiwis need not worry though, because they definitely have Ketchikan beat.